Jailed Teen Talks About Troubles, Arrest

Robert Hoehing Says He Thinks He's A Failure With No Future. He Fears He Will Become Manic Depressive And An Alcoholic Like His Natural Mother.

May 17, 1992|By Henry Pierson Curtis Of The Sentinel Staff

KISSIMMEE — Robert Hoehing turned 18 and received the birthday present most teen-agers dream of - a new car.

Four months later, Hoehing sits in the Osceola County Jail, worrying he may go to prison if convicted of trying to run down a deputy sheriff.

It's all pretty confusing and frightening for a boy whose mother still makes his bed.

''I don't want to be in prison for something I didn't mean to do,'' Hoehing said. ''All I want is to just somehow get all the trouble I've gotten in out of the way and get some help.''

The teen-ager wants help for many reasons. Most of all, he thinks he's a failure without a future. That's no simple teen-age anxiety: Hoehing asked deputies to shoot him two weeks ago.

It happened in the midst of a car chase May 6.

The chase began after Hoehing tried to steal a quart of Schlitz malt liquor from a Vine Street 7-Eleven store. Deputies who chased him knew only that a motorist was fleeing the store after refusing to stop as a clerk called for help.

Suspected of robbery, Hoehing led deputies on a 2.5-mile chase that never exceeded 40 mph. He was driving on two flat tires that blew out when he hit a curb during the chase.

Hoehing's suicidal plea came after he burst through a roadblock at Columbia and Central avenues. He maintains he lost control of the car and couldn't avoid hitting the deputy's car.

He got only a chipped tooth, despite being shot at four or five times by Osceola County Deputy Matt Breen and crashing just short of an oak tree.

''My mind was having, like, too many thoughts racing through it,'' he said. ''One thought that didn't enter my mind was to stop.''

The Sheriff's Office has ordered a routine investigation of the shooting, in which one bullet went through an apartment window, narrowly missing a woman who stood inside.

Hoehing went to jail charged with traffic infractions and two counts of aggravated assault against a law enforcement officer. He remains in jail on $11,000 bond.

Few teen-agers get shot at by police. And at first it seems especially unusual in Hoehing's case.

Hoehing's parents, Irene and John, keep their front lawn on Oak Run Boulevard as crisp and green as a Florida brochure. It's the retirement home they bought to escape the winters and grit of Queens, N.Y.

Inside, the rooms smell of polish.

The entire golden anniversary edition of Gone With the Wind plates hangs on the dining room wall.

The teen-ager's personal den holds an Encyclopedia Britannica, a stereo record player, television and Nintendo games. Framed posters from Batman, a movie he saw at least 10 times, decorate the walls.

Everything in Robert Hoehing's bedroom is neat.

The spread on his double bed hangs straight. Forty-six pressed T-shirts hang on separate hangers in the closet next to 15 pairs of pants ironed and hung.

''They've always been pretty good to me. I've never been pretty good to them,'' Robert Hoehing said of his parents during an interview at the jail last week. He also talked about loneliness, depression and never measuring up.

''I feel like I deserve to be locked up,'' he said. ''I feel like my life is never going to go anywhere. I'm not going to make anything of myself.''

Many of those doubts come from what he calls ''my problems.'' The way he describes them, Robert Hoehing's problems stem from fearing he would become manic depressive and an alcoholic like his natural mother.

''I tried telling that to my (adoptive) mother, Irene, when I was 16 or 17. I was trembling and crying,'' he said. ''She kept throwing up the past in my face. Being bad, things I did in school. I couldn't win. I was trying to tell her why I was that way.

''One time, Irene compared me to my mother and that really hurt. . . . I knew it was true. Like they say, the truth hurts.''

The Hoehings said Robert became their foster child at age 3 and their son five years later. They decided to adopt him, they said, after his mother sent him back from a weekend visit with belt marks covering his body.

Years of psychiatric therapy in Queens and Kissimmee haven't helped the teen-ager shake his fears or his longing for a brother and sister who were adopted by other families, Irene Hoehing said. She thinks that's why he was always a loner without friends. Robert Hoehing has talked to his brother once but doesn't know where his sister is.

He looks down or to the side when he talks about childhood memories. They pour out in a confusing sequence in which he blames himself at age 3 for his father's death.

Speaking of his sister, Jessica, he said, ''If she's anything like her mother or me, she's not doing well. That's why I want to see her.''

In comparison to the downward glances, Robert Hoehing looked up when he talked about becoming a computer repairman or a chef. He grinned self-consciously talking about his dream to move to California to dance professionally.

''I've been dancing too long not to be good at it,'' he said, adding that he learned to ''moonwalk'' like Michael Jackson by studying an article in People magazine.